In Defense of Soft Money

By Mitch McConnell

Published: April 1, 2001

WASHINGTON—
It now appears that among the legacies of the Bill Clinton presidency will be a ''reform'' of campaign financing that devastates the national political parties. The 1996 Clinton campaign's courting of illegal foreign contributions for the Democratic National Committee and the Clintons' use of the Lincoln Bedroom to entertain contributors, followed by Mr. Clinton's pardons for criminals championed by big donors to the Democrats, have cast a pall over national party committees. And all of this propelled the prohibition of soft money -- donations made to political parties and not subject to federal contribution limits -- to the top of the reform agenda.

Earlier, the centerpiece of reform efforts had been limits on candidates' own spending. In 1997 Senators John McCain and Russ Feingold dropped these spending limits from their reform bill, along with bans on political action committees and on ''bundling'' -- when individuals and groups collect multiple contributions.

Hard money, in Washington parlance, is the funds and activities targeted to electing specific candidates to federal office. These funds are already subject to severe contribution limits, set in 1974 and never adjusted for inflation, and to requirements for disclosing the names of donors and the amounts they gave. The national parties themselves also raise money, which they need for issue advocacy, for helping state and local candidates, for paying overhead expenses like the costs of computers and lawyers (to comply with the array of election laws), and for get-out-the-vote efforts that benefit all of a party's nominees on Election Day. This ''nonfederal'' money is subject to regulations in the ates. But because it has often been used in ways that do help federal candidates, it has come to be called ''soft money.''

The Republican and Democratic National Committees, and the Republican and Democratic senatorial and congressional committees, are national in scope. Gubernatorial and state legislative elections are among the highest priorities of the national parties, so they help candidates in those races accordingly -- with funds governed under the relevant state laws and spent in consultation with state party committees. But federal candidates are a focus of the national committees, too. And with campaigns for federal offices starved for hard money by the antiquated 1974 limits, the national parties have become increasingly resourceful in utilizing soft money to fill the void in federal elections.

In recent years, the parties have used soft money to run ads defending their nominees from attacks by special interest groups and to help challengers compete against well-financed incumbents. Help from the parties often provides the only chance nonincumbent and nonmillionaire candidates have to be competitive in Congressional elections.

The McCain-Feingold bill now working its way through Congress would prohibit the national committees from raising or spending any soft money -- that is, any money not covered by federal contribution limits -- at any time for any purpose. It would also federalize campaign-related spending by state parties in even-numbered years, thus forcing even the state parties to rely on far more scarce hard money, with results that are likely to be devastating.

Even if only one federal candidate were on the ballot in a state where the chief voter interest was in the governor's race, a mayoral contest or control of the state legislature, all party voter registration and turnout activities in that state within 120 days of the election would be subject to the severe limits on contributions set by Congress -- and therefore underfunded and diminished. Special-interest group issue ads would go unanswered by the parties. Challengers, historically shunned by political action committees but boosted by parties, would be on their own. Incumbents and self-funded millionaire candidates would flourish.

Speculation rages over which party would get the greater advantage from the ban on soft money. Many Republicans, believing that liberal-leaning news outlets will favor Democrats and noting that much of the political activity of the biggest Democratic ally, the A.F.L.-C.I.O., is largely unimpeded by McCain-Feingold's provisions, fear Democrats may be the greatest beneficiary. Conversely, there is concern among some Democrats that forcing the parties to rely solely on the limited and relatively puny hard-money contributions may benefit Republicans.

One result of McCain-Feingold is certain: America loses. The parties are vital institutions in our democracy, smoothing ideological edges and promoting citizen participation. The two major parties are the big tents where multitudes of individuals and groups with narrow agendas converge to promote candidates and broad philosophies about the role of government in our society.

If special interests cannot give to parties as they have, they will use their money to influence elections in other ways: placing unlimited, unregulated and undisclosed issue advertisements; mounting their own get-out-the-vote efforts; forming their own action groups. Unrestrained by the balancing effect of parties, which bring multiple interests together, America's politics are likely to fragment. ''Virtual'' parties will be able to proliferate -- shadowy groups with innocuous-sounding names like the Group in Favor of Republican Majorities or the Citizens for Democrats in 2012 that will hold potentially enormous sway in a post-McCain-Feingold world where the parties are diminished for lack of money.

Under McCain-Feingold, the power of special interests will not be deterred or diminished. Their speech, political activity and right to ''petition the government for a redress of grievances'' (that is, to lobby) are protected by the First Amendment. Political spending will not be reduced; it just will not flow through the parties.

Do we really want the two-party system, which has served us so well, to be weakened in favor of greater power for wealthy candidates and single-issue groups? McCain-Feingold will not take any money out of politics. It just takes the parties out of politics.

Drawing (Christoph Niemann)

Mitch McConnell, Republican of Kentucky, is chairman of the Senate Rules Committee.